Suit Filed Over Secret Army Testing in St. Louis

ST. LOUIS - A St. Louis man has filed suit over secret military-sponsored chemical testing in St. Louis during the Cold War.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that Benjamin Phillips is the sole plaintiff in the suit filed in St. Louis Circuit Court, though his attorney is seeking to turn it into a class action lawsuit.

Government contractors in the 1950s and 1960s sprayed zinc cadmium sulfide from the backs of station wagons, from atop low-income housing projects and at other locations. The government conceded in 1994 that the spraying was part of a biological weapons program. St. Louis was picked because its topography was similar to some Russian cities.

The spraying received renewed interest earlier this fall after publicity about research by Lisa Martino-Taylor, a St. Louis professor.